To Neglect
by Shun Ren Dan
Summary: Naminé works herself to the edge and threatens to collapse. Roxas is there to pick up the pieces before they can fall.


It started small.

Blocks of code in the peripheries of her vision, swimming in and out of sight like fish darting through a sea of data, trailed by bright, white tails that faded in seconds. They were flashes in the pan, small errors that brought her no satisfaction but bore her no ill will. In the grand scheme of things, they were inconsequential compared to her work, the process of bracing Sora's heart against the darkness that threatened to one day consume him.

When her work intensified, those errors escalated. Flashes that existed only in her mind's eye became corporeal, manifest in the sense that she could see them tearing through the worlds she had so carefully crafted to challenge her chosen hero. Buildings long complete would vanish, replaced by empty spaces and sketchbook drawings that she didn't remember making.

It didn't take long for Roxas to notice.

He was more bitter than the Roxas she knew, but just as observant. At first, he said nothing, tearing through the challenges meant to test Sora's will to test his own mettle and ascertain the depth of her work. It was his job to champion her cause, to make sure that the worlds she built would stand up to the scrutiny of the universe's mightiest wrecking ball. So long as she worked hard and kept him busy, there was little to complain about.

Their shared time was spent in silence, most days; hours in an empty room squirreled away in the depths of Castle Oblivion. They did not need to eat, but rest was a necessity, and as the glitches grew more frequent, Naminé found that rest was far more necessary than ever before. The little white blocks that flitted away from her core being were vampires that rendered her pale and tired by the end of the day, bereft of the steady light that usually kept her aloft.

She was in the midst of recreating Twilight Town when it hit her yet harder; blocks of data broke free of the clocktower's base and scattered in all directions, leaving the familiar structure to crumble into dust. Brick after brick vanished, replaced by stark white flashes that swallowed the world from tip to toe.

Piece by piece, the familiar walls of Castle Oblivion took its place. Strokes of brilliant twilight gave way to high-ceilings and blank, reflective floors as her migraine intensified. Her hand flocked to her head, fingers wove into her blonde curls, and she fell back into a chair that materialized beneath her with merciful timing.

"What's wrong with you?"

Roxas.

Naminé turned over her shoulder to catch sight of him, his hood down, standing in the doorway of the room that had just fallen apart. He looked stoic, severe, but the curvature of his face and the spark in his eyes betrayed his concern. The two keyblades in his hand vanished, replaced by jets of light that swallowed them whole and rendered them once again into raw data.

Before she could answer him, he approached.

"You've been hiding it," he continued. "Whatever's causing all these glitches."

"It's nothing to worry about," she replied, brushing off the concern as he came to stand beside her. A hand rose into the air and a long, white table stretched out before her. Another chair appeared at the other side, meant for Roxas.

He ignored it.

"That's not the truth."

As incisive as ever.

"I can't afford to stop working," she explained. "Worries or no worries. The datascape needs to be complete for Sora's arrival."

Roxas studied her for a long moment, and though she didn't meet his gaze, she could feel his eyes traveling over her. Dark passengers lingered on the nape of her neck, the round of her chin, studied the slope of her shoulders. A gloved hand came down upon her shoulder, prompting her to finally glance up at the boy staring down at her. Her breath caught in her throat and she stiffened in response, catching the way his eyes flickered to her thighs and the fabric of her dress before jumping to the table.

"You're working yourself to death," he concluded.

The hand on her shoulder ran like water toward the base of her neck, where his thumb and index finger kneaded away a knot of familiar nerves. Ringlets of code danced around the borders of her wrist, and she grabbed at them in vain while Roxas watched on, his face impassive.

There was so much work to do — even a moment's rest felt like too much, and with so much at stake…

"If you don't take care of the problem, it's going to get worse," Roxas continued. "You've been working non-stop. If you don't do something, it'll all be for nothing."

Naminé straightened in her chair. The hand on her neck slowly sank beneath the border of her dress, to rest at the crest of her back. She averted her gaze from him then, looking down at the table before her, her hands together in her lap. He wasn't wrong, and she knew that, but admitting that was far from ideal when there was still so much left to be done.

"I'm not sure what I need to do to fix it," she acquiesced. "It's all been crumbling."

"Why?"

"Because I can't focus. How could I, when…?"

She brought a knuckle to her lip and went silent, blue eyes searching beyond the veil for something she couldn't see. Roxas's hand left her back and found her chin, propping it up so that she was forced to look at him instead.

"Focus," he commanded. "On me."

"On you?"

She searched his eyes for a long moment, and gently nodded. It didn't take long to focus in on him. Roxas had always been there, somewhere, whether she knew it or not, lurking in the recesses of her heart like a streetlamp down a dark road. Even at his most bitter, he was so filled with the light that it sometimes hurt to look at him, and she couldn't help but wonder if he regarded her in the same way.

He was handsome, in his way; his face reminded her so inextricably of Sora's, despite the harshness of it and its representation in the datascape. His eyes were more demanding and his expression hungry, full of a longing for something she couldn't ascribe words to. He held expectations of her in ways different than anyone else, and he was a different sort of stern from the overly faux, flowery Marluxia.

And the way he stared at her—

The blocks of white around her wrist vanished, and Roxas's fingers fell away from her face.

"Focus on you," she repeated, her heart suddenly alive in her chest.

Her hand rubbed at the spot where flecks of code were flickering just a moment prior, and her gaze rotated between the boy above her and the offended spot with more than a little confusion.

For a long moment, Roxas said nothing.

She took that as an opportunity to challenge him.

"Why?"

"You're neglecting yourself," he explained. "All you're focused on is working."

"Why is that a bad thing…? It needs to be done, Roxas."

"It needs to be done, but it won't be. Not if you fall apart trying to finish it. What's all this for?"

Her lips parted to answer him, but she realized in an instant that his question was rhetorical. She could identify it from the burn in his eyes.

He leaned down, his expression more gentle than it had been a moment ago, and she found her eyes flickering back and forth between his lips and his eyes and the thought of how the former might feel.

"Let go a little."

"Let go?"

"And take care of yourself," he muttered, brushing his lips against her forehead.

The sensation of his flesh crossing hers left behind a brand of fire that jolted her awake. She stiffened in response to the contact, and Roxas paused, pulling back just an inch to examine her, lest she suddenly vanish or burst into flame.

"Roxas," she whispered, the drum in her chest now beating along to a hairtrigger tempo.

When he didn't say anything, she reached for him, her lithe fingers finding the lapels of his cloak. They hooked around the fabric, found purchase, and gently guided him downward until his lips met hers.

At once, the ball of nerves in her chest unwound, replaced by a quiet, satisfactory hum that lingered even when he pulled away from her.

Naminé watched as he discarded his gloves, depositing them on the table without a word.

She understood.

"I should focus on you."

The conclusion wasn't lost on him.

He watched her stand, eyes running the length of her legs and drinking in the paleness of her skin. She was so frail, so petite, that he wondered if even another kiss might somehow break her. When she stepped closer, her hands once again finding his lapel, his fingers latched onto her waist like anchors and dug into the fabric of her dress. It spanned the borders of her thigh to the space just below her arms, and it clung tightly to her figure.

At once, it became hard to ignore the way the fabric of it bunched up around her chest when her arms were pulled so close together, the suggestion of her breasts outlined against the white—

The suggestion of how easy it would be to dip his head, just a little, to find the nape of her neck or the lobe of her ear.

His hands ran up her sides and found her cheeks.

He heard her swallow — doubt, maybe fear, apprehension.

He didn't know until he kissed her again, bringing their lips together with a subtle twist of the head.

She was warm pressed up against him, in ways that he hadn't expected. Naminé's skin against his cloak felt like the sun burning into the shade, absolving it of its darkness, and even through the fabric Roxas found it hard to ignore that sensation and the well of desire it shattered within him. She leaned into the kiss and he returned that eagerness in kind as her fingers fell against his chest, uncertain of what to do with themselves in the heat of the moment.

It did not take him long to back her up against the table, his hands on either side of her, his lips assaulting the exposure of skin between her chin and her chest.

It started small.

Gentle pecks, quick dots and dashes that led her to stiffen up in response.

Then, little forays back up to her chin and gentle bites on the neck, applications of just enough force to keep her anchored to him. Her fingers found his hair, wound themselves up there like needles in string, and tightened whenever he nipped at her. He could hear her gasps, the way she shivered when a hand ventured from the table to her hip and then harshly to her rear. His fingers roamed the curvature of her ass until they once again met the table, and then he pulled her tight against him.

At once, she understood that his advice hadn't been for her alone. Whatever she had been suppressing, whatever stress lurked inside of her, it also lurked inside of him, and it was now being made manifest as hunger.

"Roxas," she whispered, leaning back, retreating toward the table.

"Perhaps we should…"

He silenced her with another kiss and she didn't object, relishing in the warmth of his lips against hers and the scent of sea-salt that somehow lingered forever in his hair. Her hands roamed him in response, bracing against his chest, the musculature there, and then the sides of his face when her lips parted.

He accepted her invitation without acknowledgement, his tongue searching the stars for a common denominator that might keep them bound together. When they toppled, toward the table, him atop her and her below him, he was not surprised by anything other than the reciprocity of her hunger.

The way she writhed beneath him, every gasp and breath— those notes urged him on, driving him. One hand cupped her cheek, tracing circles in the ridge beneath her eye, while the thumb on his free hand pressed down on the border of where her hip met the table.

When his lips were once again buried against her neck, he couldn't help but to notice how pale she was. Her skin was flawless, porcelain, made of something heavenly that he knew no name for. She was so soft, so fragile and yet so firm, he couldn't help but to explore her with his hands as he straddled her, lifting himself up to examine her more thoroughly.

She squirmed under him, heart beating fast, aware that Roxas's must have been doing the same, and watched as his hands left her. Slowly, they discarded his cloak, tossed it to the floor beside the table, and peeled away the shirt that covered him. Suddenly, he was bare chested before her, and she felt her face redden. Her hips shifted, legs clenching together, her entire lower half suddenly uncomfortable in the moment.

That didn't escape his notice.

A hand came down onto her thigh, and he pried her legs apart.

Her arm lifted to cover her face and hide the blush spreading across her cheeks. It felt so strange to have him looking at her, in that way, and to have his hand on her thigh and to feel the way his fingers were kneading into the flesh of her leg. The heat burgeoning inside of her did little to help the feeling, to help her forget, as his other hand came down on her other leg and left her exposed.

Roxas shifted backward and his hands roamed from her outer-thigh to the flat of her stomach. His bare skin felt warm against hers, and the feeling of his hands over her belly, the way his fingers clenched around her waist, felt comforting in the moment. The arm covering her face didn't waiver, but she managed to avert her gaze as his fingertips trailed down her stomach, found the rim of her panties, and lingered there.

In the next moment, she could feel his index finger tracing little silhouettes along the front of the cloth that covered her, looping dangerously low and then back toward the top, where a little, white ribbon waited at the hem.

And she could feel the way his lips pressed against her mound, even through her panties, and the reaction it solicited within her. The arm covering her face retreated, replaced by a single hand that she buried against her mouth and nose.

"Roxas," she began, her voice full of uncertainty.

He offered another kiss as tribute, and she writhed, her legs struggling to close despite the way he held them apart.

There was a frustration in her that she hadn't recognized before, built up from the stress and accentuated by Roxas's sudden attention. She could feel it burning in her gut, turning her entire body into a furnace. When his lips crept an inch lower, she squirmed again, her hips raising just so against him in resistance.

"Please."

Roxas pulled her panties down just far enough to expose her.

A tuft of subtle blonde waited for him there, and he buried his lips against it before dragging them lower.

His tongue found her jewel first, and he closed his lips around it slow before continuing on, exploring her and drinking in as much of her as he could.

He started slow, with a single, long lick that spanned her entirety. She shivered in response to the unfamiliar sensation, her thighs tightening around his head and then relaxing as he drew back.

When he picked up speed, she pressed her hips upward into him, spurned on by the sensation of his tongue against her womanhood and the desire that it created. It was hard to ignore the warmth, the shivers that he sent down her spine with every lick and little kiss and the way he was so focused entirely on her. It was as if every little motion brought her a step closer to absolution, and she could feel the bundle of nerves in her belly tightening as he lifted his lips once again to her stud.

He took it in his mouth and paid his tithes with a slash of the tongue.

She gasped and bucked against him, her thighs tightening around his head and her teeth suddenly clenched around the flesh of her knuckle. She didn't know when her breathing became so shallow, but she noticed the way Roxas pounced upon that weakness. Like a tide crashing upon the shore, he set upon her focus again and again, paying it more attention than she ever had.

Perhaps it was the frustration, the pent up feeling inside of her, the neglect he had mentioned earlier. Perhaps it was the desire, the fire burning inside of her stomach that bid her to accept such a forward advance.

For her, in the moment, she considered that it was for the hunger and nothing less.

That thought bid her hands to find his head, to press down, to force him to pleasure her more roughly. Freed for a moment, she relished the thought of him between her legs, and though her eyes still didn't open, she pictured him freely and let her voice slip free for the first time.

He responded to her moan in kind, picking up speed while she exhaled and ground her hips against him. She could feel the knot in her gut twisting tighter and tighter with every thrust, bidding her onward toward some sort of ancient fulfillment. Like an itch, that sensation built and twisted, flocking to her nethers, winding together in one spot that now threatened to overflow.

A particularly rough flick of the tongue sent her over the edge.

Her legs clenched hard and she closed her thighs tight around Roxas's head, pinning him in place as she unwound. He let out a muffled cry as her shoulders pressed down against the hard table beneath her and her hips surged upward one final time.

She didn't know when she stopped breathing.

Only when she began again, taking in a deep breath as if emerging from the sea and drowned in the dark waters of an unknown ocean.

Her legs slowly relaxed and lowered, leaving Roxas to straighten below.

If he had expected some form of warning, he was going to have to live with that disappointment. At least for the moment.

It felt as if her entire being had just come undone, like a ball of string wrapped together and then unspooled by the hand of a passionate guide. He hadn't been reassuring, but he had been fervent, and he had been willing, and that had been more than enough.

She was one second from breaking the silence when she heard the sound of a zipper coming undone. At once, she straightened, propping herself up onto an elbow to study her counterpart as he undressed himself completely.

His physique was impressive.

It was difficult to tell what he had inherited from Sora and what was his own, but it wasn't hard to tell that he was a little bulkier than she had expected. Where Sora was lithe, Roxas was more complete. He was far from adonis, but it was clear from the subtle scars that curved around his neck and waist that he was far more useful. Heavy blows left behind scars that she drank in with her eyes, that served as staunch reminders of the tragedy he had experienced in life.

Now, in the datascape, those scars were as immortal as they were.

She drew closer to him and pressed hand to his shoulder. When he didn't react, she gently pushed him over, now possessed by a curiosity beyond her description. Still breathless, her fingers traced the outlines of wounds she hoped never to receive, played with the muscles-in-progress over his abdomen, and looped toward the ridges of his waist. His face was so soft that it was strange to see the rest of his body so forged.

The boxers he hadn't yet discarded did little to hide the bulge growing south of his belly button. Naminé regarded it, for a second, and looked back to Roxas expectantly.

Was she expected to…?

Her hand sank low and she wrapped her fingers around the bulge of his manhood through the cloth. She could feel it surge to life at her touch, as if it hadn't already been painfully stiff, and she relished in the feeling it generated within her to touch it. She could imagine the electricity coursing through him, just as it had coursed through her a moment ago. He shivered as her hand ran up and down his length, appreciating the outline as if it were the real thing.

Tentative, she leaned forward, bringing her face closer, breathing a mere inch away from his manhood. It was strange, to think that he was just as pent up as she was, that he was handling it with such stoicism.

"Roxas, do you want me to…?"

"Yes," he breathed, voice wracked with agony and desire.

Naminé did as she was told.

Her fingers pulled down at the hem of his boxers, freeing his length and exposing it to the open air. She waited to wrap her hand around it, studying his face and the way he reacted to her touch as if it might yield some answer she didn't need.

She wasn't sure what she was supposed to be doing. Not in depth. She had a general idea, as she supposed all people did, but she was hardly the most experienced… Not even in the real castle had she—

"Up and down," he commanded.

Or perhaps it was more of a plea.

Her lips twisted upward into a subtle smile.

Her champion was so demanding that to see him rendered helpless before her — because of her — was endearing.

She followed his order, her hand stroking the length of his cock at a gentle pace. His entire body tensed up in response, his legs clenching and unclenching at her touch. To see what would happen, she picked up speed. Roxas's entire body stiffened in reply, and he thrust once, upward, into her hand.

As if to reward him for his honesty, she leaned forward, pressed her lips to the very tip of his member, and relished in the groan he produced.

It was foreign for her, to see him so vulnerable. He was usually the stoic one, so convinced that their work was what important. In his quest to comfort her, he had put that aside, and now, she supposed, it was time to reward him for that compassion. There were other ways it could have been done.

Acknowledgements.

Affirmations.

Praise.

Instead, she ran her tongue from the base of his manhood to the tip, placating him with another, gentle kiss against the very end of his being. A hand sank to cup his balls and she repeated the motion, producing an unexpected groan from the otherwise quiet man she knew so well.

"Roxas," she whispered, her lips still pressed against him.

The sound of his name bid him to look down at her.

His blue eyes met hers.

He stiffened.

"Roxas," she repeated. "Is this what you want?"

"Yes," he answered, breathless.

The smile on her face widened, just a little.

Then, her lips parted.

And she took his head between them, burying his manhood in the warmth of her mouth. A hand fell to the base of his shaft and wrapped around it while her lips sank downward, coming to meet the outline of her fingers as they rose against him.

With every stroke, he came undone.

Every little motion led him to respond to her until his hands came down on her head. His fingers wrapped themselves up in the tangles that were her curls and his toes curled as she picked up speed, aware of the way he felt and the pleasure coming his way. For all he spoke of her neglecting herself, when was the last time he had given himself the same consideration? They were two similar animals, born of the same deficiencies and flaws. He was perhaps a touch more jaded, but it wasn't difficult to see through that hazy facade of his.

Not when he was so earnest before her now, his entire body devoted to the moment and his head unable to focus on anything but the way her lips felt wrapped around—

"Naminé," he managed.

It sounded almost as if he were in pain.

She removed her mouth from him, but her hand continued the motion in its stead.

"Roxas," she whispered into his skin, lips brushing against the bells of his clocktower.

"I'm…"

"Yes?"

Naminé's mouth once again closed around the head of his member and he looked down at her, making irrevocable eye contact.

That pushed him over the edge and his entire being exploded into nothing.

He shot his being into her throat and she reacted with surprise despite the expectation. Something about the feeling of it was impossible to see coming, and she let out a muffled cry as she adjusted to accommodate him. Her hand slowly came to a stop as he finished, his breathing disrupted and his face flush. She could see the tension melting away from his body in waves, extricated from him every facet of his being.

He tasted bitter, a touch sweet, and indescribably foreign.

She mulled that taste over for just a moment before swallowing it, banishing the thought and appreciating the way Roxas shivered in response.

Roxas propped himself up onto his elbows, mimicking the way she had, earlier.

"You didn't have to—"

"I believe," she interjected, "that you said to focus."

"To focus on—"

"To focus on you."

Naminé paused, leveling the boy staring down at her with her stare. She could see the flush in Roxas's cheeks, the sudden embarrassment. In that moment, he looked so grounded, so ridiculous, and human. For just a second, he was the same boy that she knew, and she knew that he saw the same in her.

"So that's what I did."


End file.
